


Slipping Away By the Dashboard Lights

by leonidaslion



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-23
Updated: 2011-01-23
Packaged: 2017-10-15 00:47:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/155299
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leonidaslion/pseuds/leonidaslion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><b>Prompt:</b> wee!winchesters, ill</p>
            </blockquote>





	Slipping Away By the Dashboard Lights

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fates3](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=fates3).



Later, John would spend hours going over it in his mind: trying to figure out where he’d gone wrong, what signs he’d missed. Right now he was too busy speeding down the dimly lit streets to think about much of anything, with Dean a feverish warmth beside him and Sammy leaning up from the backseat with a roadmap in his hands.

“Left on Wilburne,” Sammy said.

A moment later, he fell sideways as John, catching sight of the street sign, jerked the wheel to one side. There was the squeal of rubber against pavement and he had to bring his right hand—the hand he’d been holding onto Dean with—up to even out the car before he wrapped them around a telephone pole.

Dean coughed—a horrible, rattling sound—and Sammy dropped the map to reach for him.

“Map!” John snapped.

Sammy ignored the command, climbing over the seat to grab his brother. He shouldn’t have been strong enough to move Dean, but Dean seemed to have lost so much weight over the last twenty four hours, and he was limp in Sammy’s arms. Unresisting.

Unconscious.

John had to fight down the urge to yank Dean back: to shove Sammy against the passenger door in a misguided attempt to protect his eldest. He wondered wildly how he was supposed to hand Dean over to strangers when he could barely stand to let Sammy drag the boy a foot to his right.

“Damn it, Sammy; I need directions!” John growled, tightening his grip on the wheel to keep from reaching for Dean.

“There’s only two more turns, and I memorized them. Right on Florence and then another right on Mountain. Hospital’s on the left.” Sammy wrapped both of his arms around his brother and Dean’s head lolled laxly on his shoulder. He looked fragile in the glare from the streetlights. He looked dead.

 _He’s fine. He’ll be fine._

“Check his pulse,” John choked out. As he caught sight of another reflective green sign—Florence—he gave the wheel another jerk. This time he forgot to break and skidded them sideways into what would have been oncoming traffic if it hadn’t been two in the morning.

Sammy didn’t seem to notice; he was busy pressing his fingers against Dean’s throat, obedient for once in his stubborn, willful life. Dean gave another rattling cough and Sammy immediately pulled his hand back, trying to curl into his brother’s side and hold him upright at the same time. Out of the corner of his eye, John noticed Dean’s fingers twitch, as though even now he sensed Sammy needed comfort. Needed him.

Feeling useless and impotent and so fucking guilty he could choke on it, John snapped, “Why the hell didn’t you tell me your brother was sick sooner?”

“How come you never noticed?” Sammy shot back, and John jerked in his seat, fishtailing the car a little.

 _Why_ didn’t _you notice, asshole?_ he asked himself. The thing of it was, he _had_ noticed that Dean was a little subdued these past few weeks, but he’d been too wrapped up in his research to pay much attention. If Dean had been sick— _really_ sick—he would have said something, right?

Except that he hadn’t. _Sam_ had been the one to speak up. He’d come right out with it at dinner last night, making John take the first good look at his oldest for the first time in weeks. Dean’s ‘you traitor’ glare in Sam’s direction had been half-hearted at best, and his protests hollow. But if he hadn’t collapsed when he tried to get up from his seat, then John wasn’t sure that Dean ever would have fessed up.

His chest clenched painfully at the memory of tucking Dean into his bed, back when John still thought that it was nothing worse than the flu. The boy had apologized for dragging him away from his research. For messing up the job. He’d looked so fucking hangdog about it: like he actually thought that hunting was more important than his own health.

Jesus Christ, when the fuck had _that_ happened?

John swallowed and shot another glance over at his boys. Sammy was doing his best to wrap his smaller frame around Dean, but his eyes were fixed on John. Eyes that were angry and desperate and more than a little disgusted.

John hadn’t thought that tonight could get any worse—Dean had _stopped breathing_ less than half an hour ago, for Christ sakes—but he realized with an unpleasant shock that it just had. _Sammy hates me,_ he thought. _He actually_ hates _me._

And the worst thing was, right now John was pretty sure he deserved it.


End file.
